API Checklist for Law Firms: Choosing the Right Legal Data Vendor – Josh Blandi Writes in LawNext Legal Technology Directory

The growing use of APIs by law firms has sparked a new proliferation of API solutions in the legal technology ecosystem, presenting firms with the all too familiar challenge of choosing the right legal data vendor to fit their needs. 

UniCourt is thrilled to share the latest article from our CEO and Co-Founder, Josh Blandi, that was published in Bob Ambrogi’s LawNext Legal Technology Directory: “API Checklist for Law Firms: Choosing the Right Legal Data Vendor.” 

In this article, Josh provides a pragmatic checklist for law firms who are choosing between legal data vendors, including 10 top considerations they should take into account, as well as some candid questions to ask when speaking with legal tech vendors and demoing their API solutions. 

Here below is an excerpt from Josh’s article:

Law firms need access to external data sources for a host of activities – to proactively gather intelligence on their clients for business development, to build their own analytics and proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) models, and to streamline data-intensive internal operations.

Smart law firms know they can get external data from the growing number of APIs, or application programming interfaces, offered by legal data vendors. But with the rapid proliferation of APIs, how should you go about choosing the right ones for your firm? What questions should you ask when scoping out API solutions? What red flags should you look for? Do you understand the key issues and challenges your firm is facing? And what self-reflection is needed on your own technical and business readiness to integrate APIs?

Identifying the right API solution for the legal data you need requires understanding the range of options available to solve your problem in a way that drives value and where your firm is in your data journey.

This guide will provide a practical API checklist for choosing the right legal data vendor to ensure you select the best legal technology solution for your data needs, along with the questions you need to ask to get to the right answers. To get you started, here are the top 10 considerations of what to look for when choosing the right legal data API for your law firm.

1. API-First Approach

One of the first items law firms should consider when reviewing APIs is the overall approach the legal technology provider has taken in developing its APIs. This fundamentally shapes what data a law firm can access and the potential for future enhancements of the API in the years to come.

• Is the API provider offering “app-based” APIs tied exclusively to the functionality and the data currently available in its existing applications? Or does it have “API-first” APIs, with full access to underlying datasets that are not limited to any specific application?
• Are its APIs easy to integrate? Can you easily perform searches, downloads, and automated data pulls?

2. Data Coverage

In addition to the structure, a critical consideration for law firms is the actual data sets flowing through a provider’s APIs. Even the best structured APIs are not worth purchasing if the data you need is not available.

• How comprehensive is the API provider’s data coverage? Do they cover the specific courts, legislatures, agencies, or other data sources you need?
• Does the API provider have an active data roadmap? Is it looking to expand its coverage into new sources? Does it work with clients to gather feedback on what new data sources to add to its roadmap?

3. Use Case Alignment

One of the most critical topics for law firms to consider when choosing the right legal data vendor is the alignment of the available API solution with their unique business use cases. Though each of these considerations carry significant weight, determining whether the solution matches your law firm’s applicable use cases often sparks or ends the conversation on whether to move forward with an API provider.

• Can you leverage the API provider’s data to solve your high-value problems? Have you already identified the problems your law firm is seeking to solve, and how data plays a part in solving those problems?
• Do the provider’s APIs align with your needs for business development, gathering specific intelligence or insights, or streamlining your data-intensive internal operations?

4. API Documentation

Often considered a bare minimum for a viable API product, the API documentation a provider holds out is a key indicator of the time and effort it has invested to make its APIs as easy as possible for your firm to integrate. For some providers, API docs may be an afterthought, designed by engineers for engineers, while others put considerable effort into designing the best possible user experience for learning about and integrating their APIs into your internal infrastructure.

• Is the API documentation publicly accessible for you to review? Do the API docs have a professional look and feel? Are they easy to read and understand for a non-developer?
• Are there sample code bases and walkthroughs available for how to use the APIs? Has the API provider given thought to the most common business use cases for their product, and developed step-by-step instructions to execute those use cases?

5. Data Normalization

Another important item for law firms to review is whether the API provider normalizes the data streaming out of its APIs. Just having the coverage you need is not enough. Without data normalization – the process of organizing, enriching, and standardizing data – your law firm is walking into a “bad data in, bad data out” situation that could corrupt internal reporting and disrupt law firm operations.

• Does the API provider normalize its data? Does it use best-in-class normalization on the entities included in its data sets.
• Does it use other data sources, such as bar data, Secretary of State data, EDGAR data, and other trusted, public data, to normalize the data from its APIs?

You can read the full article here on Bob Ambrogi’s LawNext Legal Tech Directory.

Choosing the Right API Solution for Your Law Firm

Want to learn more about how you can select the right API solution for your law firm? 

Speak with one of UniCourt’s API experts to get help with finding the right API solution and the legal data that your firm needs.

Speak with an API expert and get started today.

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